page_title: Cleopatra Selene of Syria
section_title: Queen consort
hierarchical_section_title: Cleopatra Selene of Syria / Queen of Syria / Queen consort
caption_attribution_description: English: from the website: CNG 109, Lot: 334. Estimate $500. Sold for $1000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee. SELEUKID EMPIRE. Antiochos VIII Epiphanes (Grypos). 121/0-97/6 BC. AR Tetradrachm (27mm, 16.35 g, 12h). Antioch on the Orontes mint. First reign at Antioch, 121/0-113 BC. Diademed head right within fillet border / Zeus Ouranios standing left, holding star and scepter; to outer left, IE above A; small N to inner right; all within wreath. SC 2298.2e; HGC 9, 1197e. EF. Well centered. From the Gasvoda Collection. Ex New York Sale XXXIV (6 January 2015), lot 187.
context_page_description: Cleopatra II Selene was the monarch of Syria from 82 to 69 BC. The daughter of Ptolemy VIII and Cleopatra III of Egypt, Cleopatra Selene was favoured by her mother and became a pawn in Cleopatra III's political manoeuvres. In 115 BC, Cleopatra III forced her son Ptolemy IX to divorce his sister-wife Cleopatra IV, and chose Cleopatra Selene as the new queen consort of Egypt. Tension between the king and his mother grew and ended with his expulsion from Egypt, leaving Cleopatra Selene behind; she probably then married the new king, her other brother Ptolemy X.
  Following the marriage of the Syrian Seleucid princess Cleopatra I to Ptolemy V of Egypt, dynastic marriages between the two kingdoms became common. In 102 BC, Cleopatra III decided to establish an alliance with her nephew Antiochus VIII of Syria; Cleopatra Selene was sent as his bride. After his assassination in 96 BC, she married his brother and rival Antiochus IX. Cleopatra Selene lost her new husband in 95 BC and married a final time to Antiochus IX's son Antiochus X, who disappeared from the records and is presumed to have died in 92 BC, but may have remained in power until 89/88 BC.
context_section_description: The marriage of Cleopatra Selene and Antiochus VIII took place c. 102 BC; historian Leo Kadman suggested that Cleopatra III gave her daughter to the Syrian king in Ptolemais before she retreated to Egypt, and that Cleopatra Selene kept that city as her main base until the end of her life. Details of Cleopatra Selene's life with Antiochus VIII are not clear; no known offspring resulted from the marriage, though six of Antiochus VIII's children from his previous marriage are known. In 96 BC, Herakleon of Beroia, a general of Antiochus VIII, assassinated his monarch and tried to usurp the throne, but failed and retreated to his home-town Beroia. The capital of Syria, Antioch, was part of Antiochus VIII's realm at the time of his assassination; Cleopatra Selene probably resided there.
  The queen held out in the capital for a while before marrying Antiochus IX. The manner in which Antiochus IX took control of Antioch and his new wife in 95 BC is not clear; he could have taken the city by force or it could be that Cleopatra Selene herself opened the gates for him. In the view of historian Auguste Bouché-Leclercq, Cleopatra Selene had little reason to trust the five sons of her previous husband; the queen needed an ally who would help her control the capital while Antiochus IX needed a wife and Cleopatra Selene's influence over the city's garrison and her late husband's officials. It is unlikely that this marriage was received well by Antiochus VIII's sons. The first of them to act was Seleucus VI who was established in Cilicia. Within a year of his marriage to Cleopatra Selene, Antiochus IX marched against his nephew but was defeated and killed. Soon afterwards, Seleucus entered the capital. Cleopatra Selene probably fled before the new king's arrival. Alternatively, she might have been sent to Arados by Antiochus IX for protection before he marched against Seleucus.
  In 218 SE (95/94 BC), Antiochus X, the son of Antiochus IX, proclaimed himself king in Arados, and married Cleopatra Selene. The Seleucid dynasty had a precedent of a son marrying his stepmother: Antiochus I had married his stepmother Stratonice, and this might have made it easier for Cleopatra Selene. Yet, the marriage was scandalous. Appian wrote an anecdote concerning the epithet of Antiochus X, "Eusebes" ("the pious"): the Syrians gave it to him to mock his show of loyalty to his father by bedding his widow. The rationale for the marriage might have been pragmatic: Antiochus X sought to be king, but had little resources and needed a queen. Cleopatra Selene was in her forties and could not simply marry a foreign king. Antiochus X pushed Seleucus VI out of Antioch in 94 BC and ruled northern Syria and Cilicia, while Seleucus VI's brothers Philip I and Demetrius III ruled Beroea and Damascus respectively. The last evidence for the reign of Antiochus X is dated to 92 BC; he is generally assumed to have died at around this date. Ancient sources contain contradictory accounts and dates, and the numismatist Oliver D. Hoover suggested the date of 224 SE (89/88 BC) for Antiochus X's demise. Antioch was taken by Demetrius III then Philip I.
caption: Antiochus VIII
exif: {}